1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a flexible hose provided with a partial air-permeability which has proper flexibility and strength despite of an air-permeable structure.
2. Related Art
In the flexible hose to be used as a sucking/discharging or blowing duct, a portion of the air to pass through the hose may have to be discharged to the outside from midway of the hose or sucked from the outside. For example, an electric conductor is inserted into the hose, but its heat generation can be suppressed by introducing cooling air into the hose. At this time, the cooling efficiency can be better improved by introducing fresh air through the individual portions in the hose longitudinal direction from the outside.
Alternatively, the entrance of a hose is disposed to face the hot wind exit of a warming fan heater to introduce the hot wind into the hose and to blow out the hot wind from the midway air-permeable portion. Then, it is conceivable to utilize the hose for drying the wash or to utilize the hose as a steamer by disposing wet cloth in the air-permeable portion.
As a structure of such a flexible hose, it may be considered that the whole flexible hose is made of an air-permeable material. In this case, however, since a large number of vent apertures are formed in the hose, there arise drawbacks that the strength of the flexible hose as a whole is deteriorated and it is difficult to maintain the shape of the flexible hose.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a flexible hose which is obtained by winding a soft resin tape helically, wherein a gap forming member which allows the inside and the outside of the hose to communicate with each other is interposed between overlapped portions of end brim portions in the hose longitudinal direction of the soft resin tape, or a gap forming concavo-convex shape is formed on a resin tape per se and the resin tape is wound, whereby the flexible hose having a sufficient strength while ensuring the air permeability can be provided.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a flexible hose which can be manufactured at a low cost since the flexible hose necessitates no special members for forming gaps and can be manufactured by merely winding a resin tape helically while overlapping end brim portions thereof.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a flexible hose in which a resin tape made of soft resin is reinforced by a reinforcing core so that the hose has a proper flexibility and a proper strength whereby the hose is the most suitable as a hose having its use in fields where the hose is repeatedly bent.
Other objects of the present invention and advantages obtained by the present invention are apparent in view of following embodiments which are explained hereinafter in conjunction with attached drawings.